Sicamous council directs staff to take a more in-depth look into curbside waste collection options

Photo: KTW file photo

Council wants district staff to take a more in-depth look at bringing curbside garbage collection to Sicamous.

At the Feb. 12 committee of the whole meeting, Darrel Symbaluk, district operations manager, spoke to council about some research into waste management following a presentation from a resident calling for curbside pickup in October 2024.

“We had Jennifer Taylor come and talk about solid waste pickup and what other communities are doing and follow up information,” Symbaluk said. “We've done a little bit of follow up and some homework.”

He said there are a number of contractors providing curbside pickup in the community, with the largest commercial company offering pickup services for $24 a month.

“I tried to get a number of what the subscription level was in Sicamous, but they haven't given me that hard and fast number,” he said. “But I would suggest probably a few hundred houses.”

He added there are a few smaller companies picking up garbage by the bag and taking them to the dump for as low as $3 per bag.

Symbaluk pointed out that with a traditional curbside pickup program, residents who don't live in Sicamous year-round wouldn't be able to opt out of garbage service.

He said the district could choose to promote existing waste pickup options, or poll the community to see if there would be interest in hiring a community-wide contractor.

Coun. Siobhan Rich said she fully supports bringing curbside pickup to Sicamous.

“I am 100 per cent for garbage pickup,” she said. “I think it just takes us into the next level of being, a forward-thinking municipality.”

She added she doesn't see a problem with not having an opt-out clause, because Sicamous residents who spend the rest of the year somewhere else are paying for garbage pickup in other communities.

“You chose to live here, this is what happens and I don't get to go to Calgary, Alberta and say, 'Hey, I only live here three months a year because I live in Sicamous, I'm not paying for garbage.'

“So I'm not sure why we're giving people that opportunity on the other side of their lives."

Coun. Gord Bushell said the decision should be part of a larger conversation, but he did support bringing garbage pickup to the community.

“It's one of the biggest complaints I get, is we don't even get garbage,” he said. “Everybody says that.”

Other councillors felt it might be better to move forward with a private contractor approach.

“I think there's a lot of issues with this,” said Coun. Ian Baillie. “There's certainly condos that have a commercial agreement, so we're really just talking about single family homes here in terms of the pickup side of it.”

He suggested approaching one of the contractors about a possible preferred vendor deal in exchange for better rates.

“I'm not sure if we actually have to mandate it right across Sicamous,” he said.

Bianca Colonna, chief financial officer, said if council made a decision on the matter, any change would likely still be a long time coming.

“Putting out a collection like this? You're looking at 2026 or 2027 just because of how big of a project it is,” she said.

She noted between research, community surveys and staff time, it could also be a fairly costly undertaking.

Colonna said she worked at the City of Salmon Arm when it started collecting food waste along with garbage and recycling collection, and that was a large undertaking that required quite a bit of staff time.

“We could try the route of promoting those additional users, put out a survey in as economical of a way as possible, and then maybe try to incorporate it for 2026 as a consultation piece. …I would say this wouldn't even roll out until 2027,” she said.

Council passed a motion to have staff explore the options for a garbage collection service and begin some preliminary consultation with the public before they bring a more comprehensive report to a future council meeting.